The football season is over...

Could anyone have beaten Lincoln-Way East this year?

...and Mike Clark of the Tribune and Beth Long of the Sun-Times have courageously included their preseason rankings next to their final ones. (MaxPreps didn't; I added what I know.)

I say "courageously" only tongue in cheek; this isn't a "gotcha" moment for me. Rating teams is a mug's game, as the Brits would say, and I doubt if I would be any better at it than anyone else. The high school football season is long -- the teams in the finals play a total of 14 games!* -- and so I find the comparison useful only insofar as it's interesting to see what the experts thought before the season started and how individual teams either surprised or disappointed them. (I'd still like to know, for example, what happened with Waubonsie Valley. Was it injuries? How did they fool Mr. Clark and Ms. Long -- who are both very good at what they do -- and even the bloodless computers at MaxPreps?)

As for the final rankings themselves, I don't have much to quibble with. I probably would have wimped out and had Phillips and Prairie Ridge tied for second, but that's about it. Yeah, Phillips beat Loyola in Week One but Prairie Ridge was so dominant all season. Could either of them have defeated Lincoln-Way East? Possibly, but I'd say the Griffins would have taken at least two out of three with each of them. (We'll never know, will we?) And what about Maine South? Does it deserve its No. 2 ranking in MaxPreps? Maybe; the Hawks' only two losses were close games with Lincoln-Way East. This is the kind of stuff we can talk about all winter.

Again, here are the final rankings with records in parentheses followed by their preseason rankings. And the actual Week One rankings are below.

Tribune:

1. Lincoln-Way East (14-0) 4
2. Prairie Ridge (14-0) 5
3. Phillips (14-0) 14
4. Loyola (12-2) 6
5. Maine South (11-2) 2
6. Batavia (13-1) NR
7. Lake Zurich (13-1) 10
8. Naperville Central (9-3) 9
9. Marist (11-1) 12
10. Nazareth (12-2) NR

Sun-Times:

1. Lincoln-Way East (14-0) 7
2. Phillips (14-0) 8
3. Prairie Ridge (14-0) 1
4. Loyola (12-2) 3
5. Maine South (11-2) 2
6. Batavia (13-1) 23
7. Marist (11-1) 10
8. Nazareth (12-2) 17
9. Lake Zurich (13-1) 15
10. Oswego (10-2) 18

MaxPreps:

1. Lincoln-Way East (14-0)
2. Maine South (11-2) 4
3. Prairie Ridge (14-0) 1
4. Phillips (14-0)
5. Loyola (12-2) 2
6. Batavia (13-1)
7. Lake Zurich (13-1)
8. Naperville Central (9-3)
9. Rochester (14-0) 8
10. Marist (11-1) 3

WEEK ONE

Tribune:

1. Glenbard West
2. Maine South
3. Waubonsie Valley
4. Lincoln-Way East
5. Prairie Ridge
6. Loyola
7. Lyons
8. Homewood-Flossmoor
9. Naperville Central
10. Lake Zurich

Sun-Times:

1. Prairie Ridge
2. Maine South
3. Loyola
4. Waubonsie Valley
5. Lyons
6. Glenbard West
7. Lincoln-Way East
8. Phillips
9. Homewood-Flossmoor
10. Marist

MaxPreps:

1. Prairie Ridge
2. Loyola
3. Marist
4. Maine South
5. IC Catholic Prep
6. East St. Louis
7. Sacred Heart-Griffin
8. Rochester
9. Lyons
10. Waubonsie Valley

* I can remember a time when colleges only played 11 games in a season.